About 10 years ago, I plotted out a hike in the southern range of the Maumturks. As you can see in the contour map accompanying this column, my route covered a “flat” distance of about 10 kilometres, travelling from east to west. I arranged for someone to drive me from the end point, where my car would await me, to the start point at the base of Corcogemore, which rose sharply from sea level to 609 metres. Not exactly a light warm-up, but it was exhilarating to reach the summit, with a 360-degree view of the region.

The way I chose relied on travelling through a series of peaks on the “saddles” that joined them—zigzagging my way through the range without having to go back down to sea level. And so, from the summit of Corcogemore, I hiked northwest and then southeast on a saddle up toward the first peak of Mullach Glas at 622 metres.

The mountains of Connemara are in close proximity to the sea, and in a single day it is possible to unexpectedly find yourself in clear skies, sheeting rain, blasting wind, or fog: very heavy fog. As I made my way along the generous summit of Mullach Glas, a thick fog suddenly started to roll in—as you can see in the second photo.

It became impossible to move safely. I had only a metre of visibility in any direction and my compass was almost useless. I tried to read the ground immediately beneath me as I moved northwest toward what I hoped was a narrow saddle with steep, craggy sides that would lead to the 630-metre east peak of mighty Binn Mhor. When I suddenly found myself on the precipice of a jagged crag, I realized I had lost all sense of location, direction, and perspective. I had to wait it out, conscious that it might be several hours or even overnight before it was safe to move.

After some attempts at moving gingerly to see if I could find the top of the saddle, only to feel the gawping edges of more crags, something remarkable happened. Suddenly, there was a gap in the dense fog that opened up like a cathedral—showing how off track I was and revealing the saddle that would take me over and up to the relative safety of Binn Morh’s east peak and the plateau that would lead to its central, 661-metre summit. I paid attention, saw where I needed to go, and moved forward with determination.

I share this story because it speaks to paying attention to moments where God unexpectedly opens up the fog in human existence to show us all what we need to know and what we need to do. The resurrection of Jesus is such a moment.

On the Sunday of the Resurrection, we celebrate the wonderful mystery of God casting aside the boundaries of time and space, causing us to see the powerful love that fills human hearts with meaning, purpose, and indestructible hope. The Resurrection of Jesus is God telling us to pay attention to what he taught if we want to find the way to walk closely with God—and actually feel close to God.

The Christian tradition affirms that God is uniquely revealed in Jesus Christ. In other words, if you want to know what God is all about, look to Jesus and you will find the answer.

Christianity holds the belief that God, the transcendent and eternal Creator of all things, visited time and space in the person of Jesus to show for all time that God is with us and that God is love.

Through Jesus, God tells all creation that nothing can be separated from God’s redeeming love, and that we will find salvation—the discovery of who we truly are and what we are called to do—when we accept and share God’s love. God, in Jesus, shows all human beings that those who entrust their lives to God can become radically free to give sacrificially to this world—to live as spiritually strong people who, with humility and confidence, seek to serve others and to challenge anything that injures, corrupts, or destroys the integrity of all that God has made to be good and just.

Christians believe that the way to God is the way of Jesus; wise Christians know that the way to God is not bound by simplistic verbal formulas, notions of prosperity, and national or cultural affiliations. If you pay attention to Jesus, you will see that the way to God is found in living your life with kindness, courage, gentleness, justice, faithfulness, compassion, mercy, self-control, generosity, goodness, prayerfulness, forgiveness, patience, trustworthiness, peace, hope, and, above all, love.

The fog of human life was opened up for an abundant moment when God raised Jesus from the dead, vividly confirming that all he taught us is trustworthy—showing us where we need to go to walk closely with God, to feel close to God. Go there with all the determination you can muster and safely find your way home.

PHOTOS: CONTRIBUTED

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In Jerusalem, there is a place called the “Garden Tomb” which was discovered in the early 1880s by Major General Charles Gordon, who had no training in history or archeology. It lies outside the walls of Old Jerusalem, near the Damascus Gate, in a place some say was the garden of Joseph of Arimathea.

The Garden Tomb is in a pleasantly landscaped compound with manicured pathways. Groups of visitors stroll around in an orderly fashion, enjoying the relative silence and lush shrubbery. You can take time in the tomb itself, which is pretty close to what you would expect: a big round stone is rolled away from the doorway, the inside is simple, still and unadorned, and there is a shelf for a body to lie on. It is picture-perfect, you might say—like being in the middle of a nicely illustrated Children’s Bible.

The more widely accepted site of Jesus’ tomb, going back many centuries, is inside the walls of the Old City in the sprawling Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It takes a moment to realize that this large, complex building sits on what was once an abandoned stone quarry, with a rocky rise called Golgotha, and many tombs. Over the years, almost all superfluous stone was hewn out and carted away, and chapels were built around the top of Golgotha and the tomb where Jesus was buried: the places where Jesus died on a cross and rose from the dead.

In the midst of various architectural styles, chapels and spaces, with dark walls, layers of holy ornamentation, many lamps, and people from every corner of the earth, stands the Edicule, the structure which surrounds the site of Jesus’ tomb. A line-up outside the entrance slowly moves along, and four people at a time are admitted into it. It is close and crowded inside, with iconography everywhere: one of the attending Orthodox priests mutters something and points to “the spot” (a horizontal ledge where the body of Jesus lay) and then it is time to keep the line moving. 

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre tears you away from the culturally conditioned pictures held in your mind: it is larger than life and filled with vibrant, sacred mystery. It is a bit like the experience of the women encountering the Risen Christ: nothing is what you would expect.  

The cruel death of Jesus on a cross at Golgotha tells us that God is present within the lowest places of our humiliations, injuries, sorrows, pain or loss. The Resurrection of Jesus within a congested tomb tells us that the hope we need to sustain us in this life can never be destroyed. It is the most profound statement of God’s abundant grace: there is always more than we can see, there are always more possibilities for life, there is always hope.

At Easter, we celebrate the wonderful mystery of God casting aside the boundaries of time and space, and the limits of our understanding, causing us to see the powerful love that fills human hearts with meaning, purpose and hope. 

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